Can you survive the stress of uncertainty, or being laid off? - Anonymous employee Cengage Employee Review

2.0
30 May 2019
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Teamwork atmosphere on projects, many very nice hard-working coworkers, work from home options, semi-casual dress, free coffee/tea/milk, and MANY catered lunches and company gatherings

Cons

The constant reorganization of teams and duties left many discouraged, unsure of who does what and fearful of job security. Management constantly boasts of "transparency", but then will make sweeping changes with little or no warning. Real concerns that talented people are being laid off because they may be more qualified to survive the upcoming merger than the managers/VPs doing the cuts. The stab-in-the-back atmosphere is driving more away as we've watched coworkers unjustifiably let go without cause or any believable explanation. This is "at will" employment at it's worst.

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3.0
4 Jun 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Company has some interesting approaches to the market and in the past they seemed value employees. There are some good employees there and there was, in the past, visionary leadership, but the people with the vision and leadership skills left the company a few years ago.

Cons

The company actively de-values employees. They had a project they called "Project Horizon" where they told all employees they needed to cut costs, so the company was going to have multiple layoffs over 3-5 years - but nobody was allowed to know when, where, or why - - just one day large swaths of people would be gone. That hung over everyone's heads - for years, and is indicative of how Cengage values employees - it doesn't. Everything is about trying to secure new funding and prepare for an IPO, so they stopped investing significantly in the products about 3 years ago and that's about when they stopped acting like they cared about employee wellness as well.

9
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